Tom Kaulitz

♡Part 41♡

Jayla tossed a blanket over both our legs like we were in some kind of dramatic indie movie. "You're repressing so hard right now it's making me emotionally constipated."

"Good," I muttered. "I hope your feelings rot."

She snorted and grabbed the remote. "You wanna cry-watch The Notebook, scream-watch Gone Girl, or pretend to be fine with some trashy reality TV?"

"Trash," I said immediately. "The more brain cells I lose, the better."

We ended up watching a show where a bunch of twenty-somethings were trapped in a house trying to find true love and clout. One girl cried because a guy called her "emotionally unstable," and another guy tried to win her back by performing a ukulele song he clearly wrote 15 minutes before filming.

Normally, I'd be laughing. But tonight, the chaos felt like background noise to the storm in my head.

Jayla was silent for a few minutes. Too silent.

"You're staring at me," I said, not looking away from the screen.

"I'm not," she said quickly. "I'm just... analyzing."

"That's worse."

She hesitated, then: "You really liked him, huh?"

I didn't answer.

Because what the hell was I supposed to say to that? Yes? Obviously? No? Not anymore? I don't know?

Instead, I stared at the screen like my life depended on it.

"It's just," she continued, "when you like someone that much, and it ends all messy and undefined and unfinished like that, it's hard not to want to... go back. Even if you know it's a bad idea."

"I don't want to go back," I said quickly. Too quickly. My voice sounded flat and defensive and fake.

Jayla didn't call me out on it. She just nodded and kept her eyes on the TV.

The silence stretched between us. I could feel her waiting for me to say something real. Something honest.

And I wanted to. I did.

But every time I thought about Tom—really thought about him—I felt like someone was wringing out my insides. Because it wasn't just the breakup. It was the silence after. The way we never got to yell at each other. Never got to cry or explain or beg or apologize. We just... stopped.

And it made it worse.

Because now my brain got to rewrite the whole thing over and over until it became something way messier and more painful than it actually was.

"He showed up at my door," I said finally, my voice quiet. "Last night."

Jayla glanced at me. "And?"

"And... I didn't let him talk. I didn't even ask why he came. I just—" I clenched my jaw. "I panicked."

"Okay. So?"

"So now I feel like shit!" I snapped, then groaned and buried my face in the pillow. "God, I don't even want him back, but the idea that he maybe had something important to say and I didn't let him? It's driving me insane."

Jayla let me rant. She always did. No judgment. No interruptions. Just space.

I sat up again and stared at the paused screen.

"I've been pretending I'm fine for so long that I think I convinced myself I actually was," I admitted. "But seeing him again... I don't know. It flipped some kind of switch. And now everything I've been avoiding is just... right there. Front and Center. Screaming at me."

Jayla nodded slowly. "So what are you gonna do?"

I opened my mouth, then closed it.

"I have no fucking idea."

And it was true.

Because the truth was, I didn't want to talk to him.

But I also didn't want to not talk to him.

I didn't want closure. But I also didn't want to live in this weird in-between forever.

I wanted things to be okay.

Even if "okay" meant never seeing him again. As long as it didn't feel like this.

Jayla reached over and gently bumped her shoulder into mine. "You're gonna figure it out. Even if you're annoying and emotionally repressed."

"Thank you," I said dryly. "You mean the world to me."

We sat in silence again, the TV buzzing in the background.

And for the first time in a while, I let myself just sit in the mess.

No fixing. No pretending. No running.

Just... existing.

TOM

I thought maybe—maybe—there was a part of her that still wanted to her me out. That maybe I wasn't the only one who'd been stuck in the limbo of what-could-have-been and what-the-fuck-was-that.

Apparently, I was wrong.

I flicked the ash out the window, dragging from my cigs like it could burn the memory out of my throat. It didn't help. It never does, but that didn't stop me from lighting another one right after.

Third smoke in twenty minutes. My lungs were gonna love that.

But I needed something to do. Something to keep my hands busy while my head screamed at me.

Why'd you go there?

Why'd you wait so long?

Why the hell didn't you say anything when you had the chance?

I groaned and dropped my head back against the headrest. The sky was that weird almost-morning gray, where the world looks hungover and half-asleep. Kind of like me.

I hadn't slept. Barley eaten. The last proper meal I had was probably whatever Bill made me choke down that one time he cornered me at the studio. And now I'd managed to screw up the one shot. I had at maybe— not fixing things, but at least explaining them.

Because the truth?

I never wanted it to end like that.

No words. No closure. Just two people too proud or too scared or too stupid to say what mattered. I'd thought about calling. Texting. Even writing some long-ass message and deleting it twenty times. But nothing felt right. Nothing felt enough.

So I showed up.

And she close the door. In my face.

That's the part that kept echoing. Not her silence. Not even the look in her eyes.

Just the click of that door. Soft. Final.

Like she was done.

And maybe she was.

Maybe it was too late.

But i wasn't ready to believe that.

Not yet.

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Very so dearly sorry i forgot abt this story again lmao i've just been focusing on school lately and stuff so bare with me😖

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